You might not like lizards at all, but you have got to admit that some of them are really cool, take geckos for example. They are those small lizards with an amazing ability to climb, so amazing that they can cross a glass window, scurry up a wall, and even walk along the ceiling. What other creature can do that? When climbing a wall, people need to wedge their hands and feet into tiny crevices, but is this the case of the gecko too? Does it use crevices that are just too small for us to see, or is it equipped with some special "tools" only geckos possess?
If we take into consideration the fact that geckos can even climb a well polished glass, the crevices theory is no longer an option. There is no way that polished glass has any crevices, no matter how small. In fact, several other explanations can be ruled out. Suction does not work because a gecko 's feet do not have a cup shape to push out air; friction might work for the wall, but not the ceiling; sticky feet could work, but the feet do not have any glands to produce a glue- like substance.
Scientists have analyzed closely and thoroughly the gecko feet, in order to find a plausible explanation for this amazing ability. The answer? It is all in the interactions between molecules. Being able to stick to the wall or walk across the ceiling does not necessarily depend on what gecko toes are made of, but the shape. Each toe has a network of many millions of tiny hairs, about one millionth of a centimeter long. At the end of each hair there are thousands of tiny pads.
A gecko can even hang by a single toe, and its entire ability to climb comes from minuscule electronic interactions which occur between molecules, called Van der Waals forces. The gecko 's foot takes advantage of these forces by packing together lots of really tiny pads, each of them only a hundred or so atoms wide.
The attraction between each pad and the molecules of the surface beneath or above the foot is very small, however when you have billions of tiny attractions, the force is multiplied. According to researchers, if all the pads of a gecko were touching a surface at one time, the gecko 's feet could hold almost 300 pounds. So is the gecko cool or what?
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Alexandra is the editor of this article, but she also started a new project about second hand office furniture. This is a website which also provides more info about refurbished office furniture.
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